Sony Refereshes Vaio Z Series With Color, New Hardware

On Monday Sony said it has refreshed its Vaio Z line of notebooks for the spring season, throwing in a dash of new color and upgrading the hardware on select models. The new color will be Carbon Silver, falling in line with the other "Carbon" colors including Carbon Black, Carbon Gold, and Premium Carbon Black.

As for the hardware, the Vaio Z Series will now include additional hardware options to choose from including built-in LTE mobile broadband support, Intel's 2nd-generation Core i5 and i7 processors, and RAID 0 SSDs. Consumers looking for a new laptop will see a Vaio Z with a starting price of $1849.99 USD.

In addition to the Vaio Z Series, Sony is also updating its Vaio S series with 2nd-generatiin Core i-Series processors for both the 13- and 15-inch models, up to Core i7. Also thrown into the mix will be Hybrid Graphics with either an AMD Radeon HD 6470M (512 MB VRAM) or AMD Radeon HD 6630M (1 GB VRAM) GPU. The 15-inch model will come standard with a 15.5-inch Full HD display (1920 x 1080) with IPS technology for improved image quality and viewing angles.

The 13-inch S Series will start at $799. The 15-inch S Series will start at $979 and includes the Full HD display and Intel Core i5 processor. Both 13- and 15-inch models will be available starting early February, Sony said.

Finally, Sony will update its 14- and 15-inch Vaio E Series models with 2nd-generation Intel Core i-Series processors as well, with pricing starting at $499 for the 14-inch model and $459 for the 15-inch model. Software updates are also planned for the entire Vaio lineup including the F Series and the L Series.

"With the updated Media Gallery 2.0, users will experience a new look and feel including new features for popular social networking services," the company reports. "The S Series will come with the update already installed and is available for users to download for other models. Also included is the Music Unlimited promotion, providing 180 days of Music Unlimited basic service for free for first time users. The F Series laptop and L Series All-in-One come preloaded with Sony Imagination Studio Multimedia Edition, a collection of audio and video editing software, including the award winning Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD."